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By Nancy Spannaus

Jan. 24, 2022-The bloody retribution and intensified repression carried out against black Virginians after the Nat Turner rebellion of 1831 are well-known. What most citizens are less aware of is the fact that this rebellion sparked a most extraordinary event: a debate in the Virginia House of Delegates over the winter of 1831-32 dedicated to the question of whether slavery should be abolished.

I was first made aware of this event through a comment by leading American System economist Henry C. Carey, who cited it in connection with the early 1830s shift in American politics in a pro-slavery direction. He believed that the defeat of the abolitionist forces at that convention was part of the crucial turning point in sending the nation into the Civil War.

So let's take a look at another one of the surprising developments in the history of the persistence of American slavery.
The Setting
The spokesmen for abolition in Virginia came from a wide range of social groups. There were the religious opponents of slavery, comprised of groups of Baptists, Methodists, and Quakers; they had been campaigning to end it for decades. Then there were the small, generally non-slaveholding farmers from the Western part of the state, who understood slavery to be part and parcel of state's oligarchical system, by which the planter class denied them representation in government and economic development. Women expressing fears of more violence from slave uprisings also petitioned the legislature asking for action.

Among the more surprising individuals supporting abolition was none other than the Virginia Governor, John Floyd, who wrote in his diary that "I will not rest until slavery is abolished in Virginia." "Before I leave this Government, I will have contrived to have a law passed gradually abolishing slavery in this State, or at all events to begin the work by prohibiting slavery on the West side of the Blue Ridge Mountains," he wrote. But he never even went public with this view.

In a paper written for Norwich University in 2016, Philip E. Grathwol asserts that a majority of Virginians at the time wanted to see the end of slavery. He also believes, along with Henry Carey, that the "Virginia Slave debates held in the wake of the Southampton uprising represented one of the last great opportunities to avoid armed conflict over the issue of slavery!"

Petitions pressing the debate were submitted to the legislature from 39 counties throughout Virginia. They ran the gamut from calls for gradual emancipation, to immediate abolition, recolonization, or even maintaining the status quo. Perhaps not surprisingly, virtually all the abolitionist petitions also included provisions for relocating freed blacks out of the state, as was being proposed by the American Colonization Society.[3]

But it was an open question whether the proposals contained in these petitions would even be debated. The preponderance of power ( i.e., representation) in both the state senate and House of Delegates was held by representatives of the Tidewater elite, the center of slave plantations in the state, and they were dead set against even the hint of emancipation.
The Debate Begins
The issue of what legislation the legislature should vote on had been delegated to a select Committee, which was discussing options for the removal of blacks from the state, and the "gradual extinction of slavery."

Upon hearing this, Tidewater delegate William Goode was alarmed. He proposed an amendment that would ban consideration of any proposal with the objective of manumission of the enslaved. He referred in particular to the petition submitted by the Charles City County Society of Friends, which demanded "some efficient system for the abolition of slavery in the Commonwealth and restoration of the African race to the inalienable rights of man." Justice demands legislating that all persons born in Virginia be free, and that provision be made to form a colony for those who wish to emigrate, the petition stated.

Goode also expressed grave concern that abolitionist proposals were now even being advocated in the major Richmond press. (See Richmond Enquirer, Jan. 7, 1832 )

Goode was countered by Thomas Jefferson Randolph, who moved that Goode's resolution be amended to call for legislation that would submit to a public vote a gradual emancipation and colonization plan. The result was to set up an open debate on emancipation itself, which lasted from Jan. 11 to Jan. 25, 1832.
The Arguments
The abolitionist side was keynoted by Rockbridge delegate Samuel Moore, who unabashedly asserted that "the right to the enjoyment of liberty is one of those perfect, inherent and inalienable rights, which pertain to the whole human race." Slave-masters try in vain to extinguish the drive for freedom, he said, through depriving the enslaved of education and imposing punishments. All they do is teach the slave the lesson of tyranny, and consequently degrade themselves. The drive for freedom is inherent in the human breast, and the enslaved Africans were human.

Moore charged that Virginia's poverty was due to the prevalence of slavery, including its effect of imbuing the white population with the sense it was "above" productive labor. Slavery also undermines our security, he added, since any foe can easily enlist the enslaved to aid their cause. He concluded without a clear plan for abolition but an insistence that one must be found.

While Moore, like many other participants, chose to hold up Thomas Jefferson's view of the evil and destructive nature of slavery in making his argument against it, the delegate never expressed any denigration of blacks' innate abilities, as Jefferson infamously did.

Delegate James H. Gholson of Brunswick County then spoke for the pro-slavery faction, stressing the U.S. Constitution's guarantee of property rights. The slave population represents the greatest source of "wealth" in the Commonwealth, and can't be taken away from us, he argued. He went on to praise slavery as a positive good for both the Commonwealth and the enslaved.

These themes were then taken up by many other delegates, alternating between scathing indictments of slavery's destruction of morality and the economy, even a "cancer" consuming the health of the Old Dominion, and craven defenses of the institution as a "humane" way of binding society together.

In the end, however, the abolitionists failed the leadership test. They were unwilling, or unable, to craft and put through a plan to abolish slavery, and consented to the conclusion of the select committee that it was "inexpedient for the present to make any legislative enactments for the abolition of slavery." Instead, the Tidewater-dominated legislature doubled down on repression, passing legislation that forbade teaching blacks (both free and enslaved) to read and write, denied them the right to hold religious services at night without a white person present, and even penalized those who refused offers to be sent to Liberia.

A backlash also hit those who had championed abolition, as the pro-slavery elite increasingly emphasized their defense of the institution. They found a champion in Thomas Roderick Dew, a William & Mary professor, who published a "Review of the Debate in the Virginia Legislature" later in 1832. Dew's book was widely read and had a major impact on the debate over the next decades, stoking Virginians' illusions that they were on the right "moral" path in maintaining chattel slavery.
A National Shift
It would be a mistake to view the Virginia debate in isolation. It occurred just as there was a national political shift toward support for the slave system, with President Jackson's destruction of the American System policies of credit, protection of industry, and internal improvements. And as the broad support for some kind of abolition reflects, the moving force behind Jackson's moves was not "the people," but the London-linked U.S. financial establishment and Southern slavocracy, both of which were immeasurably strengthened by his actions.

Would it have been possible, even at this late event, for American System proponents to peacefully prevail over the British-backed pro-slavery forces? That is a question I will explore through the eyes of one man who thought it was, Henry C. Carey, in my upcoming book.
Nancy Spannaus is the author of Hamilton Versus Wall Street: The Core Principles of the American System of Economics.
[1] See https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/virginia-slavery-debate-of-1831-1832-the/#its1

[2] Grathwol, Philip E., "Nat Turner, The Virginia Slavery Debates, and the Path Toward Disunion," capstone project, Norwich University, 2016, https://www.academia.edu/26777718/Nat_Turner_The_Virginia_Slavery_Debates_And_The_Path_Towards_Disunion?email_work_card=view-paper

[3] While the relocation idea is repulsive on its face, it reflected a wide span of motivations, which ranged from those who feared free blacks could never live well in a racist white society, to those who wanted to be rid of free blacks as they were a threat to their slave system. Many left the society when they met opposition to ending slavery in the United States among some leading members.

[4] See full text https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/petition-from-the-society-of-friends-charles-city-county-december-14-1831/#:~:text=In%20a%20petition%20to%20the,to%20them%2.

[5] An extensive summary of the debate and how it was set up can be found at https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/virginia-slavery-debate-of-1831-1832-the/#its1

[6] As most others in favor of abolition, he expressed support for blacks being subsidized to leave the state. His full speech can be found here https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/speech-by-samuel-mcdowell-moore-to-the-house-of-delegates-january-11-1832/

[7] See Dunn, Susan, Dominion of Memories: J efferson, Madison, & the Decline of Virginia, Basic Books, 2007, p. 52.

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Virginia Debates Abolishing Slavery - American System Now

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Virginia Debates Abolishing Slavery describes the widespread support for abolition which led to the legislative debate in 1831-32.

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Nat Turner was born on October 2, 1800, in Southampton County, Virginia, the week before Gabriel was hanged. While still a young child, Nat was overheard describing events that had happened before he was born. This, along with his keen intelligence, and other signs marked him in the eyes of his people as a prophet "intended for some great purpose." A deeply religious man, he "therefore studiously avoided mixing in society, and wrapped [him]self in mystery, devoting [his] time to fasting and praying."

In 1821, Turner ran away from his overseer, returning after thirty days because of a vision in which the Spirit had told him to "return to the service of my earthly master." The next year, following the death of his master, Samuel Turner, Nat was sold to Thomas Moore. Three years later, Nat Turner had another vision. He saw lights in the sky and prayed to find out what they meant. Then "... while laboring in the field, I discovered drops of blood on the corn, as though it were dew from heaven, and I communicated it to many, both white and black, in the neighborhood; and then I found on the leaves in the woods hieroglyphic characters and numbers, with the forms of men in different attitudes, portrayed in blood, and representing the figures I had seen before in the heavens."

On May 12, 1828, Turner had his third vision: "I heard a loud noise in the heavens, and the Spirit instantly appeared to me and said the Serpent was loosened, and Christ had laid down the yoke he had borne for the sins of men, and that I should take it on and fight against the Serpent, for the time was fast approaching when the first should be last and the last should be first... And by signs in the heavens that it would make known to me when I should commence the great work, and until the first sign appeared I should conceal it from the knowledge of men; and on the appearance of the sign... I should arise and prepare myself and slay my enemies with their own weapons."

At the beginning of the year 1830, Turner was moved to the home of Joseph Travis, the new husband of Thomas Moore's widow. His official owner was Putnum Moore, still a young child. Turner described Travis as a kind master, against whom he had no complaints.

Then, in February, 1831, there was an eclipse of the sun. Turner took this to be the sign he had been promised and confided his plan to the four men he trusted the most, Henry, Hark, Nelson, and Sam. They decided to hold the insurrection on the 4th of July and began planning a strategy. However, they had to postpone action because Turner became ill.

On August 13, there was an atmospheric disturbance in which the sun appeared bluish-green. This was the final sign, and a week later, on August 21, Turner and six of his men met in the woods to eat a dinner and make their plans. At 2:00 that morning, they set out to the Travis household, where they killed the entire family as they lay sleeping. They continued on, from house to house, killing all of the white people they encountered. Turner's force eventually consisted of more than 40 slaves, most on horseback.

By about mid-day on August 22, Turner decided to march toward Jerusalem, the closest town. By then word of the rebellion had gotten out to the whites; confronted by a group of militia, the rebels scattered, and Turner's force became disorganized. After spending the night near some slave cabins, Turner and his men attempted to attack another house, but were repulsed. Several of the rebels were captured. The remaining force then met the state and federal troops in final skirmish, in which one slave was killed and many escaped, including Turner. In the end, the rebels had stabbed, shot and clubbed at least 55 white people to death.

Nat Turner hid in several different places near the Travis farm, but on October 30 was discovered and captured. His "Confession," dictated to physician Thomas R. Gray, was taken while he was imprisoned in the County Jail. On November 5, Nat Turner was tried in the Southampton County Court and sentenced to execution. He was hanged, and then skinned, on November 11.

In total, the state executed 55 people, banished many more, and acquitted a few. The state reimbursed the slaveholders for their slaves. But in the hysterical climate that followed the rebellion, close to 200 black people, many of whom had nothing to do with the rebellion, were murdered by white mobs. In addition, slaves as far away as North Carolina were accused of having a connection with the insurrection, and were subsequently tried and executed.

The state legislature of Virginia considered abolishing slavery, but in a close vote decided to retain slavery and to support a repressive policy against black people, slave and free.

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Africans in America/Part 3/Nat Turner's Rebellion

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Nat Turner was born on October 2, 1800, in Southampton County, Virginia, the week before Gabriel was hanged. While still a young child, Nat was overheard describing events that had happened before he was born. This, along with his keen intelligence, and other signs marked him in the eyes of his people as a prophet "intended for some great purpose."

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Thirty miles north of Indianapolis just to the east of U.S. 31 on 276th Street in western Jackson Township, Hamilton County, Indiana, stand the remains of an African-American pioneer farm settlement. It was founded in 1835 by free blacks of mixed racial heritage who migrated mostly from North Carolina and Virginia to escape deteriorating racial conditions in the South. The majority of pioneers had the Roberts surname, but other families such as the Waldens, Winburns, Rices and Gilliams also made this migration over a period of 20 to 30 years in the mid-1800s. Their goals were the pursuit of economic, educational and religious aspirations with greater freedom and fewer racial barriers. These goals were achieved through considerable hard work and the assistance of friendly and racially tolerant white neighbors of the Quaker and Wesleyan faiths living in the surrounding area.

"...the pursuit of economic, educational and religious aspirations with greater freedom and fewer racial barriers."

Today, set on a gently rolling landscape with many woods and small streams, such as Little Cicero Creek, are a chapel and cemetery. They represent the physical reminders of a once thriving community that continued to grow through the middle1800s, reaching its zenith in the late 1800s when more than 250 residents, spread over an area of four square miles, called Roberts Settlement home. As the 1900s approached, access to inexpensive, high quality farm land was no longer possible for small farmers and their coming of age children. At the same time, well-paying factory jobs in Noblesville, Kokomo and Indianapolis fueled an out-migration that continued through the mid-1900s. Despite the fact that the number of families living in the Settlement was in decline, the relevance and the importance of the Roberts Settlement's legacy continued to guide the lives of future generations of descendants.

In 1924, the first Roberts Settlement Homecoming was organized and held on the Roberts Chapel grounds. Since then, the homecoming has occurred every year on the July 4th weekend. Descendants come from all corners of the U.S. and beyond to renew family bonds and friendships, and to celebrate the rich cultural heritage of the place we call Roberts Settlement.

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​​SEE YOU SOON! ​Roberts Settlement 100th Homecoming 6/29/23 - 7/2/23

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Frederick Douglass’ Incredible Legacy | Told by Laurence Fishburne | History at Home

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One of the most "dangerous" men in American history - Keenan Norris

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First African American novelist
1814 - 1884

William Wells Brown was born on November 6, 1814. He was a black antislavery lecturer, a groundbreaking novelist, a playwright, and a historian. Brown was born on a plantation outside Lexington, KY, to a George Higgins, a white plantation owner and relative of the owner of the plantation where Brown was born, and an African slave mother.

Brown was sold multiple times before he was 20 years old. He spent the majority of his youth in St. Louis. There his masters hired him out to work on the Missouri River, then a major thoroughfare for the slave trade. He made several attempts to escape, and on New Year's Day in 1834, he successfully slipped away from a steamboat at a dock in Cincinnati. Brown moved to Buffalo, N.Y., and spent nine years there working simultaneously as a steam boatsman on Lake Erie and as a conductor for the Underground Railroad.

In 1843, Brown began lecturing on his experiences in ending slavery for the Western New York Anti-Slavery Society, one of many American abolitionist groups. Brown eventually also became a lecturer on behalf of women's rights and temperance, but it was as a fugitive slave speaking on the evils of slavery that he was best known.

In 1847, Brown wrote the "Narrative of William W. Brown, a Fugitive Slave," which went through four American and five British editions in its first three years after publication. At this time, Brown worked for the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society and lectured around the country. His family life began to unravel and he went through a difficult divorce. He entrusted the education and care of his two daughters, Clara or Clarissa and Josephine to Nathan Johnson, a well-known African American abolitionist in New Bedford, MA. Brown's daughters lived at 21 Seventh Street until at least 1850. Between 1849 and 1854, he gave more than a thousand speeches in Europe and America and wrote two books. "Three Years in Europe; or, Places I Have Seen and People I Have Met" and "Clotel, or, the President's Daughter: A Narrative of Slave Life in the United States." "Clotel" is considered the first African American novel.

In 1854, some of Brown's friends raised enough money to purchase his freedom, allowing him to return to the United States," became the first drama published by an African-American. As the environment became increasingly dangerous for blacks in the 1850s, he became a proponent of African American emigration to Haiti. Like some other abolitionists, he also decided that more militant acts were necessary to gain progress in their cause.

Brown personified the American Dream. Born into slavery and locked into illiteracy until his escape at age 19, he became an internationally renowned antislavery activist-writer who resided in and traveled widely across the northern United States and the British Isles. Over the course of a life devoted to personal and collective reform, he wrote a series of remarkable books that includes the first African American novel, the first printed African American play, the first African American travelogue, the first African American panorama displayed in Britain, and the first history of African American military service in the Civil War.

Over the next two decades, he focused on historical works. These included two histories of the black race, another history on blacks and whites in the American South, and a rare military history of African-Americans in the American Civil War. Brown eventually settled in Boston and practiced medicine there until his death from cancer in Chelsea, MA, 1884.

Reference:
The African American Atlas
Black History & Culture: An Illustrated Reference
by Molefi K. Asanta and Mark T. Mattson
Macmillam USA, Simon & Schuster, New York
ISBN 0-02-864984-2

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William Wells Brown was born on November 6, 1814. He was a black antislavery lecturer, a groundbreaking novelist, a playwright, and a historian. Brown was born on a plantation outside Lexington, KY, to a George Higgins, a white plantation owner and relative of the owner of the plantation where Brown was born, and an African slave mother.

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On March 26, 1857, William Ellison wrote to his son Henry Ellison about the family business. Life was going well and Ellison wanted to update his son on how things were going at home. John, one of Ellison's 53 slaves had just been to the river to collect payment from a number of white slaveowners for the cotton gins they had purchased from Mr. Ellison. He came back with no money at the end of the day though. Ellison's customers had either made excuses such as wanting to consult their overseer before paying or had not been where they said they would be. There was no frustration in Ellison's tone as though this is something that he has had to deal with before. He then gave instructions to his son to purchase a number of farming tools that would inevitably be used in the fields by his slaves. He gave a brief farewell and ended the letter.

This same type of letter may have been sent a thousand times from a slaveholding father to his slaveholding son in mid nineteenth century American South. But William Ellison and his son, Henry Ellison, were different. William Ellison was African American, born into slavery in April of 1790 with the name April Ellison to a slave mother and white slavemaster father, Mr. William Ellison. As a young man he was apprenticed to a cotton gin maker rather than working in the fields and allowed to keep a portion of the wages he earned for his master and father, money that he later used to purchase his freedom.

At the same time, he changed his name to William Ellison, after his father, to fit in with higher society. After purchasing his family, he moved to Sumter County, South Carolina and hired out other free African Americans to work in his cotton gin shop. While working, he discovered a common problem among freed slaves in the South. The expense of wages left him with a profit that would never compete with what slaveowners were earning. Wanting to move up in society, he purchased his first slaves in 1820.

By 1850, Ellison had 37 slaves while his sons owned another 16. He was one of about 180 black slave masters in South Carolina at the time, most of whom were former slaves themselves. Like Ellison, they realized that the only way to get out of the lower middle class that so many freed blacks were stuck in, was slave labor. With nearly 9,000 free blacks in South Carolina, that 180 made up a tiny percentage who were willing to do anything to compete with the upper class white slaveowners at the time.

Just because they owned slaves though did not mean they were treated equally among slaveowners. As Ellison subtly hints in his letter, white slave owners would avoid interacting with African Americans as much as possible. Ellison provided many whites in the area with what were the best cotton gins available which meant that if they wanted to produce the most cotton, they would have to do business with them. They would often try to avoid paying him though. Despite the discrimination, blacks owning blacks continued all the way up to the Civil War, with many African American slave owners, including Ellison, contributing and supporting the Confederate side. Stories like Ellison's and other black slave owners showed the economic power of slavery in Southern America in the nineteenth century.

The easiest way to achieve financial and social success was to own slaves and the allure of southern wealth was enough that it convinced a few of slavery's former victims to switch to the other side.

Citations

Michael P. Johnson and James L. Roark, Black Masters: A Free Family of Color in the Old South (New York: Norton, 1984), Whole Book.

William Ellison, "William Ellison to Henry Ellison," Letter, March 26, 1857, Ellison Family Papers, South Carolina Library, University of South Carolina, Colombia, South Carolina.

1850 Slave Census Schedule, South Carolina Department of Archives and History (1850).

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Blacks Owning Blacks: The Story of William Ellison

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William Ellison Jr. (c. April 1790 - December 5, 1861), born April Ellison, was a U.S. cotton gin maker and blacksmith in South Carolina, and former African-American slave who achieved considerable success as a slaveowner before the American Civil War.

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This article was most recently revised and updated by

Richard Allen (born February 14, 1760, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania [U.S.]-died March 26, 1831, Philadelphia) was the founder and first bishop of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, a major American denomination.

Soon after Allen was born, to enslaved parents, the family was sold to a Delaware farmer. At age 17 he became a Methodist convert and at 22 was permitted to preach. Two years later (1784), at the first general conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church at Baltimore, Allen was considered a talented candidate for the new denomination's ministry. In 1786 he bought his freedom and went to Philadelphia, where he joined St. George's Methodist Episcopal Church. Occasionally he was asked to preach to the congregation. He also conducted prayer meetings for Black congregants. Restrictions were placed on the number permitted to attend these meetings, and Allen, dissatisfied, withdrew in 1787 to help organize an independent Methodist church. In 1787 he turned an old blacksmith shop into the first church for the Black faithful in the United States. His followers were known as Allenites.

In 1799 Allen became the first African American to be officially ordained in the ministry of the Methodist Episcopal Church. The organization of the Bethel Society led in 1816 to the founding of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, which elected Allen its first bishop.

The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica Encyclopaedia Britannica.

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Richard Allen | African-American, Founder, Bishop

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Born enslaved, Richard Allen founded and was the first bishop of the African Methodist Episcopal Church.

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Today, the Museum of African American History operates the Abiel Smith School.
NPS Photo/Matt Teuten

Opened in 1835, the Abiel Smith School served as a segregated public school for African American students in Boston.

In 1787, Black Bostonians, including Prince Hall, petitioned the state legislature advocating for greater access to the public school system. In 1798, Black parents organized the African School to educate their children though some Black students did attend the public schools. The African School first met in the home of Primus Hall. It moved into the first floor room of the African Meeting House in 1808. At this date, African American children enrolled in Boston public schools moved to the African School. In 1812, the Boston School Committee officially recognized the African School and started providing partial funding at $200 annually. However, the condition of the school remained poor and the Boston School Commission received many complaints from the community about deteriorating conditions and overcrowding. A study undertaken by the Commission confirmed these critiques.

In 1815, White businessman Abiel Smith died and bequeathed $4,000 for the education of African American children in Boston. The school committee used interest from this money to fund the African School and they later used a portion of it to construct the Abiel Smith School. The Abiel Smith School opened on March 3, 1835, but the conditions in this school proved inferior to those of the White schools in the city and the Black community continued to fight for equal opportunities in education. ¹

Throughout the 1840s and 1850s, William Cooper Nell, once a student at the African School, spearheaded the movement for equal schools. He vowed at an early age that he would do his "best to hasten the day when the color of the skin would be no barrier to equal school rights." ² Nell and others in the Equal Schools movement led petition drives, protests, and eventually a boycott of the Smith School.

Benjamin Roberts, another activist, filed suit on behalf of his daughter Sarah, against the Boston School Committee in 1849. Roberts wanted his daughter to be able to attend the school closest to their home, rather than the Smith School, and sought to challenge Boston's segregated system. Attorneys Robert Morris and Charles Sumner argued the case but did not win the lawsuit.

Despite this setback, Nell and others took their cause to the state legislature which finally outlawed public school segregation in Massachusetts in 1855. On the first day of school that year, Nell, then living at 3 Smith Court, recalled watching a young Black student walking past the Smith School. "Good bye forever colored school!," the student said, "Tomorrow we are like the other Boston boys." ³

Following the integration of the schools in 1855, the Abiel Smith School briefly closed then later reopened for a time as an integrated primary school. It also served as a city storage facility. From 1887 to 1941 it served as a Grand Army of the Republic chapter and following that the James E. Welch Post #56 of the American Legion. ⁴ It now houses the Museum Store and exhibition galleries of the Museum of African American History.

Learn More...

Smith Court Stories: a collaborative project of the Museum of African American History and Boston African American National Historic Site - a unit of the National Parks of Boston.

Footnotes

1. Kathryn Grover and Janine V. Da Silva, "Historic Resource Study: Boston African American National Historic Site," Boston African American National Historic Site, 2002, 79-81.

2. Dorothy Porter Wesley, "Integration versus Separatism: William Cooper Nell's Role in the Struggle for Equality," Courage and Conscience: Black and White Abolitionists in Boston, edited by Donald M. Jacobs (Bloomingdale: Indiana University Press, 1993), 210.

3. Wesley, "Integration versus Separatism," 213.

4. Grover and Da Silva, "Historic Resource Study," 82.

Additional Works Consulted

Bower, Beth Ann. "The African Meeting House, Massachusetts: Summary Report of Archaeological Excavation, 1975- 1986." Museum of African American History, Boston, MA.

Jacobs, Donald M. ed. Courage and Conscience: Black and White Abolitionists in Boston. Bloomington: Indiana University Press for the Boston Anthenaeum, 1993

Kendrick, Stephen and Kendrick, Paul. Sarah's Long Walk: The Free Blacks of Boston and How Their Struggle for Equality Changes America. Boston: Beacon Hill Press, 2004.

Wesley, Dorothy Porter, and Constance Porter Uzelac, eds. William Cooper Nell, Nineteenth-Century African American Abolitionist, Historian, Integrationist: Selected Writings, 1832-1874. Baltimore: Black Classic Press, 2002.

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Abiel Smith School - Boston African American National Historic Site (U.S. National Park Service)

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Opened in 1835, the Abiel Smith School served as a segregated public school for African American students in Boston. In 1787, Black Bostonians, including Prince Hall, petitioned the state legislature advocating for greater access to the public school system. In 1798, Black parents organized the African School to educate their children though some Black students did attend the public schools.